Who Is Shout Factory, and What Is This Site?

Shout Factory made a name for itself by acquiring the distribution rights to classic TV shows – usually ones the original owners didn’t bother to release on DVD – and making them available to fans. Releasing cult classic Freaks And Geeks on DVD was an early success; today they own the rights to a wide variety of classic sitcoms and cult comedies.

While Shout Factory has long offered its shows on Hulu, this is the first streaming site they’re running themselves. Many of the videos offered are actually just embeds of Hulu – but some aren’t. For example: six episodes of Mystery Science Theatre 3000 currently found on ShoutFactoryTV are not currently offered on Hulu.

Because of this it’s worth knowing about this site if you love any of the shows Shout Factory has the rights to. Even if you’ve no idea who Shout Factory are, this site is worth knowing about if you love classic TV.

What Kind of Stuff Can I Watch?

Browsing the TV shows you’ll notice that the selection’s not overwhelming, and ranges widely. There’s some stuff you probably recognize. A few highlights:

Oh, and Ed Wood’s Plan 9 From Outer Space, considered by some to be the worst movie of all time, is also offered. But if you love bad movies, this site has so much more to offer you.

Mystery Science Theatre 3000

The real reason you want to check out ShoutFactory, though, is Mystery Science Theatre 3000. In case you don’t know, this show featured robots making fun of bad movies.

Seriously: these movies are awful. It’s great.

If you love this show, you might have noticed that Netflix recently stopped offering it. Happily there are 30 episodes offered here, which will apparently rotate every month. Hopefully Manos: The Hands Of Fate will make an appearance.

There's not a lot you can do to work around that, at least at this point in history. Distribution rights for TV and movies is handled on a per-country basis, because before the web there wasn't a way to reach a global audience from a single platform. Until TV channels die out completely, or at least become a lot less relevant, I don't see this changing. Sorry.

Justin Pot is a technology journalist based in Portland, Oregon. He loves technology, people and nature – and tries to enjoy all three whenever possible. You can chat with Justin on Twitter, right now.